Problem with Hing Pillars

[madkins1868]

I took my recently purchased Bronco to a body shop to have them look into why there are such large gaps between the doors and the front fenders/windshield. They said that this isn't something they couldn't easily fix as it is a problem with the hinge pillar assembly and they would need to do quite a bit of work to get this aligned. The door is flush on the back end so there isn't a lot of movement they can do with the door. The issue exists on both sides but I'm only including the passenger side below. Anyone have any experience with similar?

 

[DirtDonk]

Hey madkins, beautiful looking rig!
Sorry to hear you're finding some things that seem to have not been tweaked just right when the rig was built. Did the PO say they just did a full restoration, including replacing a lot of rusted body panels? I'm hoping I'm not right, but if so they may have welded the pillars on incorrectly.
Hopefully member JamesRoney will see this and chime in. We have some fairly current discussions (maybe it was you?) going on just recently highlighting the issues with lining up the A-pillar just right to get the cowl, windshield, pillar, fender skirts, fenders, hood, grille and doors to line up just right.
Basically trying to tweak any one of those other things can put the others further off if the A-pillar is installed incorrectly.

Some basic things to look at first though, would be the body mount insulators. Are they new? Are they old rubber and sagged out? If they look old, or even if they're new, measure them and see if they are 3/4" tall or not. More or less can indicate other things. Even Ford added shims to the body mounts during assembly to correct things like door gaps and such.
Not as extreme as yours might be, but some.

And your hard top may not be pulled out far enough as well. Everything has to be working together. Windshield frame angle, top location before it's bolted tight, A-pillar placement, body mount heights, etc.

Hopefully it's simple adjustments. But time will tell where the problem is located.
have you posted up other pics of your bronco elsewhere? Be great to see some more shots.
Oh, and don't overlook poor fitting door seals!

Good luck.

Paul

 

[chuckji]

Based on the first and last photos, it looks lit it has a tilt up hood, not the factory hood.
probably therein lies the problem.

 

[madkins1868]

Based on the first and last photos, it looks lit it has a tilt up hood, not the factory hood.
probably therein lies the problem.

That is correct. It has a custom, tilt up hood.

 

[madkins1868]

Hey madkins, beautiful looking rig!
Sorry to hear you're finding some things that seem to have not been tweaked just right when the rig was built. Did the PO say they just did a full restoration, including replacing a lot of rusted body panels? I'm hoping I'm not right, but if so they may have welded the pillars on incorrectly.
Hopefully member JamesRoney will see this and chime in. We have some fairly current discussions (maybe it was you?) going on just recently highlighting the issues with lining up the A-pillar just right to get the cowl, windshield, pillar, fender skirts, fenders, hood, grille and doors to line up just right.
Basically trying to tweak any one of those other things can put the others further off if the A-pillar is installed incorrectly.

Some basic things to look at first though, would be the body mount insulators. Are they new? Are they old rubber and sagged out? If they look old, or even if they're new, measure them and see if they are 3/4" tall or not. More or less can indicate other things. Even Ford added shims to the body mounts during assembly to correct things like door gaps and such.
Not as extreme as yours might be, but some.

And your hard top may not be pulled out far enough as well. Everything has to be working together. Windshield frame angle, top location before it's bolted tight, A-pillar placement, body mount heights, etc.

Hopefully it's simple adjustments. But time will tell where the problem is located.
have you posted up other pics of your bronco elsewhere? Be great to see some more shots.
Oh, and don't overlook poor fitting door seals!

Good luck.

Paul

Hi

It has a custom fiberglass tilt hood which was added. Not sure if the pillars were welded incorrectly (how can I check that?). I'll check the body mount insulators. Here are some other shots

 

[Broncobowsher]

I would start with the foundation. Frame, body mounts, body. The body brace at the footwell is well known for collapsing even when the rubber is still good and that can really wack the door alignment.

That flip front doesn't help things at all. Normally you can tweak the angle of the A-pillar by shimming the core support body mounts. But without structure there it doesn't do anything. The normal body alignment consists of moving 2 rigid boxes around (up and down on the body mounts). The front box is the front clip, Core support to the fire wall sitting on the front 4 body mounts. The second box is the bed, sitting on the rear 4 body mounts. By moving those two boxes up and down, changing heights and angles, you dial in the door openings. A fair bit of mind games, thinking of cause/effect relationships.

Getting all those gaps lined up is going to be very challenging on that Bronco. The fresh paint makes things even harder. And if body panels were not welded in the right places...

 

[DirtDonk]

Well, sharper eyes than mine were on the job. Luckily!
Chuck saw the tilt front end right off the bat, but I totally spaced on it.

One trick that was being bandied about by James Roney again, is to run a straight edge, preferably a wooden ruler to take it easy on the paint, and be at the right thickness, right up the front edge of the door and see where the top of it meets the windshield hinge.
If I remember right, the correct orientation for the pillar is to have the door edge go straight to the tip of the hinge point.
I’m on my phone so I can’t look it up easily, but maybe someone can find that discussion and post a link here.

 

[bronkenn]

The door seems to fit the quarter panel pretty good so I would guess the front fiberglass section was not fitted right.

 

[chuckji]

Thinking out loud, but one other thing to consider is the arc that the rearward section of that hood/fender follows when opening, and the clearance to the leading edge of the door. How close does it get when it's swinging open - that'll tell you how much tighter the potential fit could be.